In truth, the Edison company actually made three different films of strongman Eugene Sandow to be released to the Kinetoscope parlors and all of them made in 1894. Not only was the first one, entitled "Souvenir Strip of the Edison Kinetoscope" (and later retitled "Sandow No. 1" after the others were made) the third known film made in 1894, it was also as a result the first known film to be placed in a genre of 'performance' films. This long-running genre could include films of almost anything: Annabelle Moore doing the serpentine dance, Ena Bertoldi doing amazing contortion stunts, Juan Caicedo on a high wire, etc. Some might argue that "Sandow No. 1" is not a performance film, that all Sandow does is just stand in medium closeup and flex, but I would disagree. Yes, no stunts are performed (it would have been nice if they'd tried a more interesting action shot) but this was in truth part of Sandow's routine and it would be incorrect to call it as such.
On the other hand, it's possible that the other two films did include more action, yet they no longer appear to survive. The biggest probability is that the first was remade twice because the original negatives wore out from having too many copies made; but if that was the case, it would be a slightly odd (and ironic) that it was the original that stood the test of time.
Because of these brief filmed acts that became popular because of the original popularity of the performer, Edison was thus the most prominent film director of movies throughout 1894. When 1895 struck, he would be faced with a new problem: the Lumière Brothers. Their father Antoine had already been to the U.S. to view movies on Edison's Kinetoscope; yet upon his arrival home and informing of the brothers of the great inventor's achievement, he dismissed it and told them they could do better. After the first commerical exhibition of films in France on December 28th, 1895 at the Salon Indien, the company would be faced with competition and eventually resort to abandoning the Black Maria to shoot subjects in natural settings. Until then, the Kinetoscope parlors would make quite the profit in the dozens of performance movies and boxing shorts that crammed their machines.